The clatter of the gravel and dirt underneath the wheel hummed through the truck as Elaine sped through traffic lights, Adam held onto the grab handle for dear life as Juan and I clawed into the seat in the back. The view from the window was a blur of dark colours merging together with the odd bright light of a car's headlight. Within the truck, time felt like it was moving through jelly. Each moment felt like forever. I looked to Juan beside me, he would throw his moppy hair out of his face every few seconds as they fell in front of his black glasses, yet in his eyes a look of determination that I had never noticed carried weight in the amber. The curves in his muscles were showing through his shirt like he wasn't wearing anything. He caught me examining him, but I didn't stop on his account, I was trying to piece together what I had missed, how I couldn't have known.

"Are you going to ask or are you just going to stare me down like Sauron?" He asked.

"How long have you been in The Foxhole?"

"I was born into it." He said tentatively.

"Why were you in Cross County then?"

"I was there to watch over you and Stephy."

"No, don't give me vague answers. Be specific." I said with grit in my words.

He looked towards the carriage floor, lights from outside caught in the reflection of his glasses. "After your father died, your mother went silent. We, The Foxhole, had kept in communications with her until that day. Maybe it was because she wanted to distance herself and you guys from this other life, try to give you both something normal or maybe it was too hard for her to know that it was this that got him killed. Regardless, you were still Francis' children which meant that you could be Amps. For a while, they had other people watching you from a distance but when I was old enough, it became my job and that was when we first met."

"Old enough?" I basically laughed. "We were ten."

"Yeah, and at ten I could put a bullet through a target two football fields away with a 10 mm."

"So, what? Is that your power, Deadshot like accuracy or is it Loki like deception?"

He paused for a second, briefly glanced up at me only to look down again. "I don't have any." He whispered almost ashamed of the words that he said. "I guess bisabuelo  didn't feel like sharing before he died."

"What does your great-grandpa have to do with it? I mean I remember you saying you looked up to him a lot."

"I mean how could I not. He left such a legacy to fill, being one of the founding members who started The Foxhole."

A part of it began to click in my head. "Wait, your great-grandpa was-"

"Carlos Manuel Leonard Estaban. The Fox." He said his name with pride but at the same time with distance. The words echoed an emptiness he felt he needed to fill.

"That doesn't change the fact that for the last six years you've been lying to me," I said with less anger, but with more pain.

"I choose this mission. I choose to watch over you, I don't even know why." He said trailing off, staring out into the night as lights whizzed past. "Maybe it was because I thought it was my trip to finally getting noticed. I mean I would be protecting Francis Stark's kids. Maybe I was tired of being cramped up in The Foxhole with Mother trying to make me into my bisabuelo and yayo. All I know is that my life wasn't half as amazing as I thought it would be until I got to Cross County and met you and Pep."

"Really, spy stuff and superpowers weren't amazing." I scoffed.

"You mean constant training and envy of the people around me to try to match up to someone with those powers. To even be half as useful as they were. Yeah, of course, I think discovering the Star Wars movies and riding to a coffee shop with people who I really thought of as my friends was infinitesimally better than all that." He sighed the words out with frustration.

I could feel the uneven earth in my seat as we drove. I looked at my friend, finding it hard to meet his eyes as my heart sank when I looked at him. "So, this whole time you've been working with The Foxhole to watch over me and Stephy." It began to really absorb into my mind.

"Yes, but that doesn't change that you have become my best friend."

"We're getting closer guys, five minutes," Ellie called out from the front.

"So, when you and Ellie were talking at the Storm Watch party?"

"I was figuring out why she was there without telling me she was coming."

Knowing that Ellie knew about it seemed to leave a sting in my chest. "How has Pep been? She was a bit off when I saw her."

He let out a shaky breath when I mentioned her name. "She's seen a lot. More than I would hope." He started to crack his knuckles again. "She's seen so much death and destruction while under Transgress. She's not the same person she was before all this. You wouldn't even think that this all from just a month of being there."

"She shouldn't have even been with Transgress."

"It was her choice to join, I was going to do it regardless, but I made sure that we stuck together." He moved to his other knuckle, going through each finger. "She's seen Amps kill so many people. She watched so many get slaughtered and that changed her. She has a lot of distaste for Amps."

"I wish this whole thing was a dream. That I would wake up and go back to school, deal with McFaralen and just go Benny's beans for coffee with you and Pep."

"It's not a dream." Ellie called out to us in the back, "We're coming up to the A.R.D.O Labs. Get ready." Elaine shouted as she plowed through the road where we had first been stopped by the soldier and continued forwards as a rattling tap began to hit the back of the truck. Sparks flew off the exterior plating as bullets ricocheted off of it. More and more bullets flew towards the armoured vehicle but that didn't stop Ellie, she stomped on the pedal as we flew towards the gate.

"Oli, we need to take out those towers and the gate," Adam shouted as he opened up the hatch on the roof of the truck. I began to hear my heart pound in my ears. "Shot a fireball the watchtowers."

He stuck his head out the window and flung lightning bolts at the tower on his side, I followed suit by opening the windows but the moment I stuck myself out the window and saw the watchtower, the memory of Rev slaughtering soldiers with my powers. I looked at my hands not even a lick of fire would erupt from my palm and I don't know if I wanted it to. "I can't," I said simply as I rolled the window back up and sat in the seat, holding my palm in as if a cut had gone right through.

"Fine. I've got this." Adam said with slight frustration in his voice. The blue in his eyes glowed like an artist's daydream, an ocean of vibrant blue and silver with brief dashes of purple, like a storm at sea. Lightning poured out of his pores like a Tesla coil. The sky growled as grey clouds swirled above the base, engulfing the stars as thunder and lightning dominated the sky. Then, like the vengeance of Zeus himself, pillars of lightning crashed down from the sky and into two watchtowers. Chunks of concrete flew in different directions, showering the forest floor, the towers collapsed in on themselves. Adam, still seeping lightning, focus his power towards the gate and released everything inside him. What came out was a sphere of white light that zipped towards the gate so fast I would have missed it if I blinked and the moment it touched the gate, like a flashbang, the night sky turned to day. It was so bright, even the inside of the tinted truck was filled with nearly blinding light. As the light dimmed all that remained of the gate was rubble and the more resilient edges were glowing a luminous orange like the colour of Rev's eyes. Throughout all this, Ellie hadn't once lifted her foot off the pedal as we drove into the compound. The same field that flourished with happy soldiers, frolicking to and fro between buildings was now the field with discombobulated soldiers and others that were eager to shoot at us. Adam slumped into the truck smelling like a fork in a microwave, he caught himself on his chair but weakly. His pores still seeping lightning but slowly diminishing. "I'm fine," He said simply as he lumbered his way to the front. "Juan, what do we have to do?"

"We need bombs so head for the armoury," Juan called out to the front. "There should also be a passage underneath the armoury that leads to the lab from what I gathered while I was here."

"That's in the security HQ building connected to the tower Oli and I were in, right? The one we can't enter without a band because we are Amps?" Ellie asked.

"Yeah. So how are we going in?"

Ellie didn't need to answer as she drove the truck over the grass and drove straight through the security headquarters entrance. Glass shattered and concrete collapsed around the truck, the force of breaking through flung all of us forward, the seatbelt strap stung across my chest and my neck clicked in eight different sections. "Is that a good enough entrance," Ellie asked.

I removed my seatbelt and tried to force the door open to no avail, a pillar of the entrance had toppled over against the door. Juan was the first to push open the hatch over the truck, the flickering light on the ceiling allowed light into the dim cabin. We each crawled out one by one with Adam being the last one to exit. I supported him out and helped him gain his balance against the fragment-covered floor. Juan unholstered his gun and held it at the ready, Ellie and Adam did the same grabbing their weapons and preparing for a battle. "Lead the way." Adam gestured to Juan.

As we walked, I noticed the walls were a dim bone white that resonated inside my chest the more I look at it, they felt lackluster besides the random painting or commendation to a soldier. The inside of the building reminded me of the Transgress base in Colorado but mixed with a hospital, the flickering lights and the sound of our movement against the thin carpeting echoing through the halls of the security building left me feeling wary of what's to come. The carpets we treaded against was a nasty mixture of blue and orange with inconsistent splashes of purple and green. Each step Adam took was like pulling a slice of cheesy pizza away from another as strings of static electricity clung to his feet. Ellie's hair bobbed up and down against her neck, their colours contrasting against the shifting hallway, the black and purple made the walls seem striking and unavoidable. Juan was at the front, peaking around each connecting corridor like a refined soldier. Everything about him was so different from what I'm used to, his posture was straighter and the way he moved was so fluid, this was where he belonged, out on the battlefield. The clumsy, unsure person I knew was gone, and this confident and direct version of him was what I had left. From the end of the corridor, I could hear the pitter-patter of feet and the faint sound of commands being screamed at the top of someone's lungs.

"At the end of this hall is an atrium that connects this place to the armoury. That is where the soldiers are going to readying themselves for us." Juan said without stopping, his gun aimed forward at all times.

"I'm low on juice but I can still fight," Adam said as he held his javelin with both hands ready for a fight. "Oli, you're going to have to use your powers."

"I can't. After what I did. I can't."

"He's not asking you to turn someone into a brisket," Ellie said coldly. Her fans were in her hands, the rings were blunt and pointed towards the nearing light of the corridor. 

"You'll be a liability if you don't." Juan said concerned, "We won't get through this if you don't."

My muscled tensed with reluctance. "Fine," I said. In my chest, I felt a conflict rage on. both violent and undying. Rage and morality bot at each other's necks, trying to best the other. Until now, I had left them to do as they wish, not truly invested in who would win but now I had to force a truce. In the bitter truth, a flame bloomed upon my palm. Slowly, this flamed rose grew across my hands in a weak pale flame. Its taunting whispers turned to a dreadful roar, within howling lay the screams. I tried to desperately drown it out, but it felt overwhelming in my head. Rather than continue fighting it, let it all in as I recited my mantra in my head over and over. With enough time, the screams became mutters that sought to break me down, that I could handle. I've been telling myself those same things for years "If they are waiting for us, why exactly are we walking to them?"

"Because what else can we do," Adam said.

We got closer to the atrium and I could see three rows of soldiers pointing their guns down our hallway, their black and grey tactical were illuminated in the glow of the moonlight that shone in from the glass skylight above. A spiral staircase extended behind them that led up to the next floor, the railing was an aquamarine tinted glass that looked like slate with the silver rays descending from above. "Don't shoot!" Juan shouted out to the soldiers ready to gun us down.

"Why shouldn't we traitor?" Major Kevin Colts walked up from behind his troops; trench coat draped over the clothes he had worn earlier. His Bereta in hand, holding it as if unsure of whether to shoot or not. 

"Other than the rugged good looks and the undeniable-" Juan started before being cut off.

"You really want to test me right now Mr. Serrato. He doesn't die, kill the others." He said to his men that were cocking their guns to prepare to shoot.

"You wanted us to join you, it's a little hard to do that when we are dead," Ellie exclaimed to her father.

"That was before you jumped out of my office window and then incinerated my soldiers!" He shouted to us but his eyes directed towards me. "That's deal is long gone, you're criminals that are trespassing on private property, giving us the right to empty our magazines into your bodies. 

"So, you're going to kill your daughter. The only family you have left?" Ellie asked. Partly trying to goad a reaction out of him but I could momentarily hear the sadness in her voice.

For a second he paused, "Would you forget all of this Foxhole crap and join me? This is just to you Elaine. You could lead the Gemini. You could help me."

"After everything you've done and said. Never in a million years." 

"Then you have your answer." The words came from a place of pique and resentment. "Any last words?"

"I'm sorry about your men, I really am," I said before letting a torrent of fire out of my palm, just in front of the soldiers to have them scurry backward. Before them now stood a miniature wall of fire between us and them.

"Elaine!" Adam said, but she was already on it. She grabbed the three of us and teleported us behind them watching them start to rain bullets into the hallway we were just in. Juan didn't hesitate to run down a different corridor to have us chase him down before the soldiers noticed we weren't where they thought we were. This corridor was wider than the last one, the walls were a depressing grey that absorbed the little light being produced by the quivering ceiling lights. I let the flames on my hand die out as we ran. Even using a bit of my powers like that felt wrong. The way their eyes lit up with fear before the flame hit the ground was painful to remember, but a part of me enjoyed the fear. After a short run, we made it into the armoury and I was not sure what I was expecting but this was way more extravagant than what I could have thought. The grey walls extended into the high-walled chamber that stretched to the size of two basketball courts. Hooked onto the walls on either side were gun racks filled with every single type of artillery imaginable from 7 mm pistols to guns I thought could only be found in a science fiction novel. I have never seen this many weapons; it was probably tenfold the number of guns and ammunition The Foxhole could even imagine having. In the centre of the chamber were an assortment of cabinets and storage crates were stacked atop each other, we followed Juan through the dimly lit room to the Jenga pile in the centre. Each crate labeled the contents of what was inside with black paint, he took off all the crates until he stopped on one labeled "C4".

"Grab duffle bags from there and fill the bag," Juan told Ellie. "Adam, help me place a few of these crates then put them in the four corners of the room."

"What do I do?" I asked.

"Fill the bag with C4, we'll have to split up and cover up the most ground. I suggest you and I go to the lab, Adam and Ellie plant as much C4 on anything that supports the building." He said as Ellie chucked me a duffle bag. Ellie and I filled the bag with the plastic explosives as Adam and Juan moved the crates rigged with explosives into the corners of the room.

"There's only one detonator," Ellie commented as she closed up her bag.

"We'll take it, but it means coms need to be on." Juan walked back to the centre and strapped the duffle bag over his shoulder. "As soon as you have all of them planted get out of the building and send a message on coms."

"I don't think we should split up; this place is crawling with Transgress Soldier plus two Gemini's," Adam said as he grabbed the other bag. 

"We have to destroy this place no matter what and this is how we do it," Juan said confidently.

"Fine, but please be careful," Adam responded fretfully, he gripped the duffle tight then hesitantly left with Elaine back the way we came, leaving me alone in the armoury with Juan.

"Which way do we go then?" I asked the moppy-haired soldier.

"The soldier I spoke to said it was the gun rack at the end of the room," Juan said as he walked in that direction. He started knocking against the wall behind each rack until a hollow echo rattled the metal. "Give me a hand." I went up to the wall and helped him push against the rack until it gave way with a gust of cool wind to a hallway lit up by only the light fixtures attached to the walls. Juan smiled giddily, "Secret tunnel, cool."

The light bounced off the linoleum floor as we continued onwards, our boots sounded like window cleaner against a glass surface and the sound carried itself through the hall. Juan kept a gentle pace slightly ahead as I trailed behind. I hadn't heard a single peep from Rev since I told him to shut up, which isn't a complaint but more of an observation, it didn't change the heaviness in my head of his presence. Also, I don't understand Transgress' obsession with hallways, it seemed to extend forever but also seemed to become narrower with each step we took. Gradually the colour of the walls shifted to a darker tint of grey that seemed to make the hall more foreboding and ominous. Finally, we were met with a wall at the end of the corridor, no handle to pull on or any kind way to open it up, besides what looked like a biometric scanner. Juan put his hand against the scanner to only have the monitor blink Access Denied in scarlet red. 

"How are we going to get through this?" I asked.

"We have a bag filled with explosives." He said with a smile going from ear to ear. He pulled out a clump of plastic explosive, placed it against the stone wall, paired it to the detonator, and pulled me away from it before pressing the button. Chunks of stone sprayed around us, a cloud of dust and smoke lifted gracefully like a curtain to reveal a brand-new entrance. We walked through to reveal the lower level of the lab, the high-ceilinged chamber was just as long as the armoury but twice the width. Tables and high-powered equipment were scattered as far as the eye could see, the electronics hummed and buzzed the mechanic's lullaby as chemicals bubbled and fizzed in their flasks and beakers. At the far back of the room, there was an elevator shaft and a set of stairs that clung to the walls as it went up with a bright silver banister. Juan scoped out of the room before going to each corner of the room and place chunks of C4 against the walls and columns. I wandered over to the workstations and upon one of the tables were six veils of chemicals each labeled with masking tape and a black sharpie, all with the same name: Roboro. 

"Juan, they finished the drug," I called out to him.

"Shit." He dropped the duffle and made his way to me. He grabbed a test tube filled with the ruby liquid and brought it up to his eye. 

"Do you think they have any outside of the facility?" I asked as Juan stared deeper into the chemical.

"Doubt it. We- They were going to release in two days, so I bet it's going to stay that way till then. Take three and I'll take the other three."

"I thought we were going to destroy everything here. Isn't that the point?" I asked him as he stuck three veils into his bag.

"It was but... but things change. We can get this checked out back at The Foxhole. This could help us keep the high ground." He spoke like he was trying to reach out to me even though we were right next to each other.

"I don't know, let's ask the others." I reached for the earpiece, but Juan grabbed my hand.

"We don't have to tell them right now, trust me. I've done enough missions to know when we have something good. So, grab the other three and look out for anyone." Before I could continue to protest he walked away and placed more C4 around the room.

It wasn't long after when we got the call from Adam and Ellie saying they were out of the building and ready to detonate the explosives, Juan didn't mention finding Roboro and there clearly wasn't any plan to despite what he said earlier, but it wasn't my main concern. I could hear people coming up from the corridor leaving the stairs as the only way out, which was also likely crawling with Transgress soldiers that would very happily shoot us down without hesitation. Juan finished placing the explosives around the room and came up to me.

"Weld the pass shut." He told me, pointing at the metal door that brought us into the room.

"Sorry, what?"

"They will open it sooner or later. I'd rather it be later. Go, fire or something."

"I'm not a blowtorch!" I told him off. "I mean, do you know how hot steel has to get to melt because I researched it when I got my powers. It's 1370 degrees Celsius, the fire I make is lukewarm at best."

"Yeah, and bone melts 1670 degrees Celsius." He said grimly.

I bit down my lip to stop myself from saying something I shouldn't, I went up to the door and let a torrent of fire burst out of my hand. For a while, the door refused to heat up but after a while, the door began to ooze where it met the fire. Luminous orange glowed against the door as it merged with the metal frame, slowly the gap between the two was filled with molten steel. Only seconds later a banging against the door echoed through the chamber, followed by the muffled shouts of Kevin Colts'.

"Come on, kid," his voice softened through the door. "There's no way out of this that ends well for you."

"Trust me, I'm well aware," I called out. "about the not ending well part. We can all get out perfectly fine. All you have to do is get out of the building."

Juan and I took off up the stairs before he could rebuttal. We were led to a door at the top of the staircase which opened up to the laboratory floor that Ellie and I were on earlier. White light poured in from the windows, which illuminated everything around us including the figures in front of us. The girl with the chestnut hair and beside her Justin, a scowl took place over his usual grin.

"Where you off too, Stark. The party's just starting." Justin snarled.

"Dude, can you put the jokes on hold." The girl said to him. "I want to get this over with quickly. We're supposed to be on a plane right now."

"Margo, I need to savour this."

"And I want to savour some sleep on a jet."

"Hey, you two," Juan exclaimed. "Can we get this done quickly, I have pizza delivery coming and I'd like to get back before the pizza does." He unholstered the gun and shoot at the girl, she turned to metal just in time to have the bullet ricochet off her.

"Okay, I'm mad." She growled, then marched her way towards us with Justin following behind her like a shield.

"Oliver, get ready for something slightly dumb," Juan said as he pulled the detonator out of his pocket, still firing the gun in his other hand. Before he could do anything with it, the device was thrown away by a gust of wind, skittering under a table. Justin then forced us away with another gust of wind, throwing us to opposite sides of the room. I crashed into a worktable; all its items fell off with me.

"I never really thought I wanted to kill you Stark." Justin hovered towards me in a cyclone. "But now that the option is presented to me. How can I turn it down?"

"If I'm going to die, I would like you to know that you are a piece of shit." I grabbed the closest thing to me and chucked it at him. I scampered away as he blew the item away from his face, I threw fireballs at him as I ran; trying to get as much distance away from the angry teen. The metallic tink sound that followed after each gunshot gave me hope that Juan was still alive but not that he was winning. I tried not to worry about him because I had my own pressing issue to handle. A minuscule part of me wanted Rev to come out and end this whole thing, but I suppressed the thought. Even then, he hadn't made so much as a peep. My thoughts stopped as I was picked into the air and slammed down onto the quarts floor like a ragdoll, above me Justin stood triumphant as I squirmed in pain. With the last shot of energy in me, I lashed out at him with a burst of flames out of my hand. He flew off of me screaming, his arms shot to his neck as he began to stumble onto the floor. From where I could see only one way out of this, the detonator that lay enticingly under a table. I crawled towards it, slowly but surely. My arms stretched as far as they could, trying my all to grab the device. Then a brittle wind ripped the air out of my lungs, I rose off the floor as I tried to breathe to no avail. More air left my lips as my body was spun around to meet Justin. From his right shoulder to under his chin, blistering red and peach colours combined with each other as it sizzled into one, charred skin outlining it like a child drawing.

"THAT'S IT! I'VE HAD IT WITH YOU!" he screamed at me. "I hope you suffer."

As the last of my air left my lungs, I made an obscene gesture with my left hand as I showed him the detonator that was in my right. Before he could even react, I pressed down on the button.